Sam Hardwick's web journal

Sometimes when I’ve had enough to drink and lie on my back I get the sensation of drifting down (or everything else drifting up) and gently rotating around an axis that goes through my belly. It’s like being in a deep pit that’s swirling around – according to my dad it’s known as the “swirling pits”. I wonder is this a particular experience alcohol brings on; I’ve never felt a rotation any other way when drunk. It would be nice to rotate around the axis that goes through the hip, or the one that goes through the top of the head.

From browsing catalogues of psychedelics I know that it’s possible to have surprisingly precise sensations with the right chemicals (“this one makes you lose the ability tell different-pitched sounds apart”), so if alcohol only provides this one rotation, I’m sure someone’s found a way to get the other degrees of freedom too.

edit: now that I think about it, I’m not sure is the swirling pits sensation so much rotation about the belly as rotation about the head. I’ll find out next time I have the opportunity. For science!